al, and the laws by which they acted irrevocable. I
also added that if we had adopted the mode of making these tubes which
our philosophers would have recommended, (but that we were a practical
people) we might have saved in a few years a quarter of a million of our
golden coins. 'Spangles,' said His Majesty, who had lately seen me
weighing one of the golden likenesses of our beloved Queen against a
Brobdingnag spangle that had fallen from the dress of some maid of
honour. Spangles or not, I replied, they were very dear to us, dearer
than body and soul to some, so that we were wont to say when a man died,
that he died 'worth so much,' by which we meant so many gold coins or
spangles, at which His Majesty laughed heartily. I then went on to tell
the King, of our river Thames, that it was wider than His Majesty could
stride, that we were very proud of it, and drank from it, and that all
these tubes led into it, and their contents were washed to and fro by the
tide before the city; and, then, my good Glumdalclitch seeing that I had
talked a long time and was much wearied, took me up and put me into my
box and carried me away. But not before I had heard the King speak of my
dear country in a way which gave me great pain. 'Insufferable little
wretches,' His Majesty was pleased to say, 'as foolish when they are
living at peace at home as when they are going out to kill other little
creatures abroad,' with more that was like this, and not fit for me to
repeat."

In sober seriousness, this subject of sewerage has been most absurdly
neglected. I do not blame any particular class or body of men.
Parliament has been repeatedly applied to in the matter, but nothing has
been done, as it was a subject of no public interest, though it is
probable, if the truth were known, that in those Sessions in which the
subject was mooted, there were few questions of equal significance before
the House. There are excellent suggestions in the Health of Towns Report
for improvement in the original construction of sewers, for their
ventilation, for their being flushed, for making the curves at which the
side sewers ought to be connected with the main trunks, for a better
system of house drainage, respecting which Mr. Dyce Guthrie has given
most valuable evidence, for the doing away with unnecessary gully drains,
and for conducting all the contents of these sewers, not into our much
loved river, but far away from the town, where they can do no